0000000001185368
AUTHOR
Alessandra Maria Vitale
showing 8 related works from this author
Molecular Chaperones and Thyroid Cancer
2021
Thyroid cancers are the most common of the endocrine system malignancies and progress must be made in the areas of differential diagnosis and treatment to improve patient management. Advances in the understanding of carcinogenic mechanisms have occurred in various fronts, including studies of the chaperone system (CS). Components of the CS are found to be quantitatively increased or decreased, and some correlations have been established between the quantitative changes and tumor type, prognosis, and response to treatment. These correlations provide the basis for identifying distinctive patterns useful in differential diagnosis and for planning experiments aiming at elucidating the role of t…
Air Pollution: Role of Extracellular Vesicles-Derived Non-Coding RNAs in Environmental Stress Response
2023
Air pollution has increased over the years, causing a negative impact on society due to the many health-related problems it can contribute to. Although the type and extent of air pollutants are known, the molecular mechanisms underlying the induction of negative effects on the human body remain unclear. Emerging evidence suggests the crucial involvement of different molecular mediators in inflammation and oxidative stress in air pollution-induced disorders. Among these, non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) carried by extracellular vesicles (EVs) may play an essential role in gene regulation of the cell stress response in pollutant-induced multiorgan disorders. This review highlights EV-transported ncRN…
Quantitative immunomorphological analysis of heat shock proteins in thyroid follicular adenoma and carcinoma tissues reveals their potential for diff…
2019
Hsp27, Hsp60, Hsp70, and Hsp90 are chaperones that play a crucial role in cellular homeostasis and differentiation, but they may be implicated in carcinogenesis. Follicular neoplasms of the thyroid include follicular adenoma and follicular carcinoma. The former is a very frequent benign encapsulated nodule, whereas the other is a nodule that infiltrates the capsule, blood vessels and the adjacent parenchyma, with a tendency to metastasize. The main objective was to assess the potential of the Hsps in differential diagnosis and carcinogenesis. We quantified by immunohistochemistry Hsp27, Hsp60, Hsp70, and Hsp90 on thin sections of human thyroid tissue with follicular adenoma or follicular ca…
Muscle Histopathological Abnormalities in a Patient With a CCT5 Mutation Predicted to Affect the Apical Domain of the Chaperonin Subunit.
2022
Recognition of diseases associated with mutations of the chaperone system genes, e.g., chaperonopathies, is on the rise. Hereditary and clinical aspects are established, but the impact of the mutation on the chaperone molecule and the mechanisms underpinning the tissue abnormalities are not. Here, histological features of skeletal muscle from a patient with a severe, early onset, distal motor neuropathy, carrying a mutation on the CCT5 subunit (MUT) were examined in comparison with normal muscle (CTR). The MUT muscle was considerably modified; atrophy of fibers and disruption of the tissue architecture were prominent, with many fibers in apoptosis. CCT5 was diversely present in the sarcolem…
Structural and Dynamic Disturbances Revealed by Molecular Dynamics Simulations Predict the Impact on Function of CCT5 Chaperonin Mutations Associated…
2023
Mutations in genes encoding molecular chaperones, for instance the genes encoding the subunits of the chaperonin CCT (chaperonin containing TCP-1, also known as TRiC), are associated with rare neurodegenerative disorders. Using a classical molecular dynamics approach, we investigated the occurrence of conformational changes and differences in physicochemical properties of the CCT5 mutations His147Arg and Leu224Val associated with a sensory and a motor distal neuropathy, respectively. The apical domain of both variants was substantially but differently affected by the mutations, although these were in other domains. The distribution of hydrogen bonds and electrostatic potentials on the surfa…
Missense Mutations of Human Hsp60: A Computational Analysis to Unveil Their Pathological Significance
2020
Two chaperonopathies have been linked to mutations in the human hsp60 (hHsp60; HSPD1) gene, but other existing variants might cause diseases, even if there is no comprehensive information about this possibility. To fill this vacuum, which might be at the basis of misdiagnoses or simply ignorance of chaperonopathies in patients who would benefit by proper identification of their ailments, we searched the sequenced human genomes available in public databases to determine the range of missense mutations in the single hsp60 gene. A total of 224 missense mutations were identified, including those already characterized. Detailed examination of these mutations was carried out to assess their possi…
Hsp60 Post-translational Modifications: Functional and Pathological Consequences.
2020
Hsp60 is a chaperone belonging to the Chaperonins of Group I and typically functions inside mitochondria in which, together with the co-chaperonin Hsp10, maintains protein homeostasis. In addition to this canonical role, Hsp60 plays many others beyond the mitochondria, for instance in the cytosol, plasma-cell membrane, extracellular space, and body fluids. These non-canonical functions include participation in inflammation, autoimmunity, carcinogenesis, cell replication, and other cellular events in health and disease. Thus, Hsp60 is a multifaceted molecule with a wide range of cellular and tissue locations and functions, which is noteworthy because there is only one hsp60 gene. The questio…